Use of mobile computing devices (hereafter “mobile nodes”) such as laptops, notebook computers, personal digital assistants and cellular telephones is becoming increasingly popular today. These mobile nodes enable users to move from one location to another (“roam”), while continuing to maintain their connectivity to the same network. In order to roam freely, networks typically conform to one or more industry-wide mobile IP standards. More specifically, the Internet Engineering Task Force (“IETF”) has promulgated roaming standards (Mobile IPv4, IETF RFC 3344, August 2002, hereafter “Mobile IPv4,” and Mobile IPv6, IETF Mobile IPv6, Internet Draft draft-ietf-mobileip-ipv6-24.txt (Work In Progress), June 2003, hereafter “Mobile IPv6”) to enable mobile node users to move from one location to another while continuing to maintain their connectivity to the same network.
Mobile networks typically include various network components to enable packet routing. Many of these network components may not be currently optimized for mobile IP roaming.